ASTERACEAE  

Subshrubs or shrubs, rarely perennial herbs, hairy or sometimes glutinous. Leaves alternate, dentate to serrate or entire, sessile or subsessile, not decurrent. Capitula disciform, mostly in leafless, terminal, corymbose cymes, rarely few or solitary; flowers white, yellow or purplish. Involucre ovoid, broadly campanulate or subhemispherical; bracts in few to many rows. Receptacle concave or convex, sometimes honeycombed, epaleate. Marginalflorets female, filiform, 3-lobed, in 1 to few rows. Style entire or almost undivided or sometimes divided; style branches with obtuse sweeping hairs reaching below the furcation. Discflorets functionally male; corolla tubular, widening upwards, glabrous, with 5 lobes, glandular on margins. Anthers calcarate and caudate; endothecial tissue radial. Cypselas cylindric, hairy, without resin ducts. Pappus of free, barbellate, capillary bristles in 1 row, each bristle with patent teeth. x = 10 (polyploidy).

Perennial herbs or subshrubs; stems long, slender, tangled, thinly white-tomentose, leafy. Leaves alternate, small, elliptic to suborbicular, apex obtuse or rounded, sessile or shortly petiolate, margins entire, flat or undulate, upper surface generally cobwebby (hair type B), glabrescent, lower white-tomentose. Capitula disciform, small, many in small compact corymbose clusters terminating branchlets. Involucralbracts in 3 or 4 rows, inner +/- equalling or slightly exceeding florets, tips opaque white, obtuse, radiating; stereome undivided. Receptacle shortly honeycombed, flat, epaleate. Florets +/- 10-40, female flowers 3-30, fewer to more than bisexual flowers, narrowly tubular or filiform; bisexual flowers tubular below, slightly expanded above with 5 deltoid lobes, glandular hairs on backs of all lobes; corolla yellow sometimes tipped pink or purple. Anthers ecalcarate, caudate, tails either shorter or slightly longer than filament collar; with small obtuse or subacute deltoid apical appendage; endothecial tissue polarised. Style branches truncate and penicillate, short obtuse sweeping hairs extending briefly down backs of branches. Cypselas small, oblong, wall flat, apparently without crystals, oblong duplex hairs with swelling cushion always present, myxogenic. Pappus bristles scabrid above, bases cohering by patent cilia, lightly fused as well in 1 species; cells with delicate wall thickenings.

Much-branched shrublets. Leaves in fascicles, involute ericoid, twisted at base, up to 5 mm long, puberulous or glabrous, acute, mucronate. Capitula discoid, 5-flowered, corymbose. Involucral bracts in 8-11 rows, stereome undivided, outermost bracts green, inner ones reddish above stereome, otherwise whitish to entirely white. Florets perfect; corolla narrowly cylindrical with 5 erect, narrowly triangular lobes. Anthers with long, acute, abaxially concave apical appendage narrowing at base and with margins of short dorsiventrally erect-spreading cells, tails long, much-branched. Cypselas (immature) ovoid, covered with twin-hairs; endocarp of +/- 10 cell layer thick testa with a marked pallisade-like epidermis of in transverse-section narrowly oblong, semitransparent cells. Pappus bristles serrate, distinctly connate at base into an irregular ring, shaft apically barbellate with free or slightly fused, acute, not clavate cells.

Shrubs or subshrubs, glabrous or pubescent. Leaves alternate, small, linear or subterete, sometimes appressed, entire or lobed; often with secondary shoots in axils of primary leaves. Capitula radiate or rarely discoid, few-flowered, solitary at apex of branches or laxly corymbose, pedunculate or rarely sessile. Involucre campanulate to subglobose; bracts in 4 or 5 rows, sometimes with membranous tip, ciliate, glabrous, sometimes glandular on back. Receptacle flat or slightly convex, epaleate. Rayflorets female, fertile; corolla white or yellow; tube with oblong or elliptic, minutely 3-toothed lamina, 3-4 times longer than tube, glandular. Discflorets bisexual, fertile; corolla tube short with distinct campanulate, partly enervate, 5-lobed limb. Anthers ecalcarate and ecaudate; with oblong or lanceolate, apical appendage. Style terete, sometimes swollen at base, with linear, truncate branches. Cypselas ellipsoid-obovoid to terete, with 10-18 rounded ribs, minutely papillose, apically with entire or toothed thickened rim, rarely developing into small crown. Pappus 0.

Subshrubs. Leaves alternate, linear-lanceolate or oblanceolate, sessile with half-clasping base, coriaceous, with entire to denticulate and often somewhat revolute margins. Capitula radiate, solitary, on long peduncles. Involucre broadly cup-shaped, ecalyculate; involucral bracts +/- 11-15, in 1 row, basally connate, lanceolate, coriaceous, with distinct subscarious margins. Receptacle flat and wide, glabrous, smooth, punctate, epaleate. Rayflorets female, 5-8; tube cylindrical, with few to many gland-tipped hairs; lamina elliptic-oblong, apically trifid, white or cream-coloured. Style branches glabrous, apically tipped with conical obtuse appendage. Cypselas oblong, with 5 or 6 obliquely curved, wing-like ridges, dark brown to black, glabrous. Pappus bristles in many rows, white, barbellate, caducous. Discflorets bisexual, many; corolla tubular, apically 5-lobed; lobes ovate, apically papillate. Anthers ecalcarate, caudate, bases auriculate; apical appendage ovate, large; endothecial tissue radial. Style branches with continuous stigmatic surfaces, apically distinctly conical-convex, outside surface papillate towards apex. Cypselas narrowly oblong, with 5 obliquely curved, wing-like ridges, brown, densely hirsute on ridges with mucilaginous hairs. Pappus bristles in many rows, white, barbellate, persistent.